cubicle47b
Member
Some people actually didn't like that about Dragon Age 2.
Rimworld has some pretty...interesting sexuality mechanics (RPS)
- Thread starter The Technomancer
- Start date
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
I do think that there are very different conversations to be had around games that feature a finite number of defined characters and games that rely on procedural generation
When it comes to something like this, the code in question represents a view of "how human sexuality is" (as opposed to "how this cast of characters is") that features some pretty severe gender biases, and the developer's reaction (and past history) don't appear particularly pleasant when confronted with this.
Dwarves aren't real, whereas Sims and the humans of Rimworld are, you know, humans. Like you or I. Dwarves can be given whatever fictional rules they want as they arent real. That does however, not stop them from presenting the world in a certain way that normalizes certain aspects of our world that aren't particularly progressive through how their characters interact.
I don't recall The Sims eliminating the actual possibility of bisexuality in one gender. Nor do I recall Sims of either gender being unable (whether through code or through player action) not being able to react to constant advances from other Sims. In fact, i recall the exact opposite
A sim being born and maturing faster than it would in reality is more a concession to the fact The Sims is a game, as the world of the Sims and Simcity in general run much faster than our own, and would require the entire game to be rethought to account for actual aging and real world time passage. A woman or LGBTQ person not being able to respond to other characters or men not being bisexual is not a concession to the idea of Rimworld being a game, it's a conscious choice to limit the models expressed by a system the game already had in place - and the dev's response to the article makes me think it was not accidental but based on his own worldview.
Again, the game has "romance code" for straight, bi and gay characters so it's not about it just being too hard for the dev to create that kind of AI, it just inexplicitly removes the bi possibility from men and the straight possibility from women because apparently all bi men are gay but just don't admit it and no such thing as a straight-woman-who-doesn't-want-to-experiment-with-other-women exists.
autoduelist
Member
I'm curious if someone could detail any 'rule set' about relationships that couldn't be determined to be offensive. While I agree there seem to be some very problematic issues in the rules listed in the OP, it seems to me any attempt to proceduralize 'pawn' generation would necessarily require rules and those rules would always have real life exceptions, meaning those people would feel excluded. Heck, even if one offered every option, there might be issues with the percentage chance associated with each characteristic. But in order to proceduralize anything, you do need rulesets. And if you created some sort of 'universal' ruleset that gave every individual, regardless of other characteristics, the same chance of 'attractivness' to other pawn demographics [ie, every individual has the same percentage chance for every factor], you may avoid most pitfalls, but would, in the process, be creating your own version of a digital utopia that may not have any grounding in the real world.
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
I mean, I think you could probably address most of the problems here pretty simply:
-Normalize the chance of being bisexual, gay, or straight across men and women instead of this weird gender divide
-Normalize the degree to which people find different ages attractive or unattractive instead of, again, dividing it by gender
-Remove the hit that being disabled makes to a person's attractiveness.
-Don't just make rejection emotionally negative for men being rejected
Like...where is the desire for these parameters to be "reflective of the real world" coming from, and who exactly is defining "the real world" of the sexuality spectrum?
it's honestly kinda dumb that people are trying to pretend as if people are offended at the game itself and not the awful way the developer reacted to criticism and his attitudes in general
the game is mostly fine, with interesting and diverse mechanics. the RPS article focused on one small part of it in order to use it as an example of how personal biases can create an accumulation of small design decisions that can overall limit how your game systems behave.
then sylvester took that criticism and wildly overreacted in the most stereotypical paranoid gamergate manner one could possibly imagine. that is the problem here.
the game is mostly fine, with interesting and diverse mechanics. the RPS article focused on one small part of it in order to use it as an example of how personal biases can create an accumulation of small design decisions that can overall limit how your game systems behave.
then sylvester took that criticism and wildly overreacted in the most stereotypical paranoid gamergate manner one could possibly imagine. that is the problem here.
UncleSporky
Member
However, you're downplaying the underlying malice of the article writer, and overemphasizing the developer's reaction. It's pretty clearly a hit article on a game the guy is passionate about.
He asked the writer to be quoted in full and not have his comments cherrypicked, and didn't even get a reply. Perhaps if they'd had the decency to tell him they weren't willing to do that, they could've continued a dialogue. The developer might've agreed to other interview terms, for all we know. Instead, after cutting off all communication they went ahead with the article sans his inclusion. I'd be pretty frustrated too.
You say his reaction was paranoid in a thread that fully justifies his concern.
Ignoring his completely scientifically and historically flawed argument about sexuality. The societal expectation that men have to be the initiators in a relationship affects both genders. Men walking down the street throwing around dating requests and women receiving them on a constant basis is not how it works.
Isn't that obvious? People want a simulation, and that being rejected actually effects the mood seems like a pretty cool detail that other games miss. Now of course will there be issues when the creator has more controversial views, and that's fair to critize but the desire to get the simulation close to real life seems pretty normal to me.
HP_Wuvcraft
Banned
Sadly, "kill the gay characters" isn't that uncommon to hear.
Sorry, are we reading the same article?
We're talking about the RPS article linked in the OP, right? Because I couldn't find any "underlying malice" in there. Seemed more like someone just voicing a genuine concern to me. But maybe I'm not good at reading subtext. You'd have to elaborate on this one for me, I think.
firehawk12
Subete no aware
Yeah, because it made it seem like they didn't care enough to write characters who were of a particular sexual orientation, so they just wrote generic romances and changed around pronouns.
JinjoUnchained
Member
I for one am glad this isn't another ice cream cone thread.
I agree with both of you. I just cant help but chuckle when we do try and start a civil dialog it is very quickly met with hostility and nastiness. Look no furthur than the pokemon boy/girl question thread.
Hopefully the dev will make changes to have bi men.
I think people are just going to have to accept that sexuality is a touchy subject that means different things to different people and people will react in different ways over something that is deeply personal.
I can easily see why some people would have been offended by the developers views (and his frankly bullshit excuses and attitude) but coming into the thread and saying "wow you guys are getting worked up over nothing" or the ever helpful "wow people are offended over anything these days" contributes absolutely nothing and is bound to make threads like this get somewhat heated.
Expecting a "civil dialog" in threads like this is foolish because there will always be those who are genuinely offended and upset and the ignorant people who don't understand why said people are upset
I can easily see why some people would have been offended by the developers views (and his frankly bullshit excuses and attitude) but coming into the thread and saying "wow you guys are getting worked up over nothing" or the ever helpful "wow people are offended over anything these days" contributes absolutely nothing and is bound to make threads like this get somewhat heated.
Expecting a "civil dialog" in threads like this is foolish because there will always be those who are genuinely offended and upset and the ignorant people who don't understand why said people are upset
i thought his long answer of this subject on reddit was pretty good
https://np.reddit.com/r/RimWorld/comments/5ax9a9/some_notes_on_recent_controversies/
what you guys think?
https://np.reddit.com/r/RimWorld/comments/5ax9a9/some_notes_on_recent_controversies/
what you guys think?
His defense is that basically people didn't read his code right lol.
In addition to that, he also contradicts what he said in the comments section of the article about his "research."
Easy to hide behind everything as "bugs" but the way he reacted in the comments in the RPS article speaks volumes.
Also starting the post by saying the whole situation is "banal" is trivializing the whole thing.
well but is he right about that much of that was the interpretation of the blogger about the code? Cause it's really easy to read the code and imply nonsense stuff from that (i do agree that saying the situation is banal is trivializing but a lot of the interpretation seems sketchy, too, like this)
and i think you saying 'its easy to hide everything as bugs' is not fair because in most of the post he doesn't do that. The game IS in early acess, though, so maybe some of it are bugs?
anyway the situation is shitty all around, i don't think that reddit explanation was bad tho
Certainly possible that every piece of code was misread by the RPS writer, but the stuff about the forum being a huge alt-right circlejerk (albeit according to one poster) and the ridiculous response by Ty in the comments, I'm more inclined to think this dude has some pretty old school ideas about sexuality, gender, etc. and it bled into his game.
no i don't think every piece was misread (he even says he's going to correct some of that stuff), just that the way he (apparently) was open about this on reddit was a good response to everything happening
also you can't blame the dev if the community is shitty, i mean look at (the now dead) bioware's forums
i could be wrong and he's a dick, though, who knows
Yup, I guess it'd be presumptuous of me to assume it's intended and he's a huge asshole but I've become so wary recently with the weird backwards bullshit that gets thrown into games to push stupid agendas.
That was my first thought as the game is Early Access and the systems in play are already ridiculously complicated.
Messofanego
Banned
Did you read the whole article? Cause I'm not seeing this "underlying menace" on the part of Claudia Lo. If you want to make a hit piece, you don't go into such detail about the code and try to reach to the developer for a Q&A. If there's any malice, it's on the part of the developer who refuses to be questioned unless if he gets full editorial control of the interview, which is not allowed in journalism. Of course they can do an article without an interview, because the article makes a lot of good points that code is never neutral and that humans are programming these relationship mechanics, which leads to women having little agency and not being able to refuse men over a certain age limit or never being into younger men or there being no negative consequences for men continuously harassing women or that women can't be just straight or that bisexual men just don't exist. These kind of barriers don't just come out of nowhere.
Yeah, that's pretty bad. Yikes. Has he backpedaled on this one?
So the issue is that this sort of stereotyping is damaging and necessarily perpetuates those stereotypes. Realism is not an excuse to generalize minority groups, especially in a negative way, not the least because those generalizations are not themselves true in all cases. If you want to include an unattractive disabled person, be my guest. But don't make literally every disabled person unattractive in the name of "realism."
On a somewhat-related note, can you point me towards a "feel-good escapism adventure for disabled people?" In my two decades of gaming I have found none of those.
Edit: LurkerPrime's post below mine quotes some useful context. Makes a bit more sense with that explanation. Not perfect, but better.
30yearsofhurt
Member
Disappointed in thread about game called 'Rimworld'.
Whoops! That was supposed to be a quote.
LurkerPrime
Member
In the reddit thing he explains the disability attraction penalty thusly:
...And as an aside, Tynan's comments about player-facing interpretation makes me wonder how he would react if Claudia had simply analysed Rimworld's romance, attraction, and orientation mechanics without digging into the code.
The other stuff sounds fine and reasonable, but this section in particular raises my eyebrow (it's the rest of the disability attraction answer I quoted above):
I can get that he's frustrated, but to so thoughtlessly demean Claudia Lo's work is gross.
So, yes, that is actually what's happening, but it's a side-effect of what it was built for without really considering the ramifications in the rest of the game.
The orientation stuff is kind of weak, because like it or not the game clearly identifies gay pawns (it is a trait) and not straight or bisexual pawns, so by his same reasoning players should assume that bisexuality in Rimworld doesn't exist. They will rarely if ever see displays of bisexuality for female pawns (because they will likely be snatched up by male pawns before initiating romance themselves) and will never see it for males because it simply isn't possible in game, as per his (current) code. So he's not going to have an upper hand here by either a player-view or code-view; no matter what, one group is left out in the cold.
...And as an aside, Tynan's comments about player-facing interpretation makes me wonder how he would react if Claudia had simply analysed Rimworld's romance, attraction, and orientation mechanics without digging into the code.
The other stuff sounds fine and reasonable, but this section in particular raises my eyebrow (it's the rest of the disability attraction answer I quoted above):
Blogger, really? RPS is not a blog; it's like calling him a hobbyist or modder instead of a game developer.
I can get that he's frustrated, but to so thoughtlessly demean Claudia Lo's work is gross.
A lot of people don't like that approach because it seems unlikely there are societies with absolutely no sexual taboos. I remember articles pointing out it's unfair to gay people that you can just choose to be gay to fulfill your fantasies without any consequences whatsoever when the reality is obviously the complete opposite of that.
Messofanego
Banned
To counter-point, I've read stuff about Dragon Age 2 from LGBTQ+ writers that posit because it's a fantasy game, having a fantasy world where gay or bi characters exist without negative consequences can be a good escape for people who identify as that so they don't need to feel bad all the time.
Stumpokapow
listen to the mad man
My instinct would be that if I played the game, I would be like "Oh, that's a little weird" and that'd be the end of it. I didn't even click on the thread to begin with because the title didn't really catch my eye. But then when the story broke that the developer got into a weird eDrama argument and it became a proxy for the gaming culture wars, I smhed a bunch and that was the end of that.
As someone who tracks Kickstarters, Rimworld has been really great with delivering a steady flow of progress and great communication and I get the impression it's way beyond the scope originally promised and still growing. It's a pity to see the developer self-sabotage by responding in a way that presents the culture wars ultimatum to prospective customers on any side of the argument. It seems the exact opposite of the stated goal of taking politics out of gaming to take an unremarkable mechanical decision and make the defence of it explicitly politically and drag all this other stuff into it.
By far the best response. The response to hate - if you can even insinuate hate in this case, it seems more likely that he didn't do proper research and just hastily designed that system - should never be more hate.
Take it easy people. Hating will do you more harm than good.
D
Deleted member 231381
Unconfirmed Member
This is especially weird given that the game that inspired large parts of Rimworld, Dwarf Fortress, is actually really good about this. Dwarves can belong to one of two sexes, male or female. Each dwarf can receive one of three possible reactions to a given sex - they can be disinterested / interested, but not in commitment / interested in commitment (the former will take lovers but not marry, the latter will attempt to marry partners). If you ignore for a moment the difference between the commitment levels, that allows for four basic sexual attractions: straight, bisexual, homosexual, asexual. Both male and female dwarves are equally likely to end up in any of those four categories (and both have even stances on commitment).
It's not perfect - it does dichotomize a fluid range of possibilities into four discrete categories. But as an abstraction of something enormously complex, it does an excellent job, and I've had various different dwarven couples that I've been pretty strongly attached to as a result of the level of depth that goes into the relationship mechanics. It's pretty common for players to do generation games, where they attempt to create dynasties of the original dwarves, just to see how the families progress and how the relationships form.
It's not perfect - it does dichotomize a fluid range of possibilities into four discrete categories. But as an abstraction of something enormously complex, it does an excellent job, and I've had various different dwarven couples that I've been pretty strongly attached to as a result of the level of depth that goes into the relationship mechanics. It's pretty common for players to do generation games, where they attempt to create dynasties of the original dwarves, just to see how the families progress and how the relationships form.
Crazymoogle
Member
No offense to online writers, but are we sure this is an insult? If I was just a casual browser and I saw the website, what are the odds i wouldn't say that? Wikipedia says it's a blog outright. Unless you're writing professionally it would seem difficult to connect "blogger" in an offensive way.
JasoNsider
Member
I don't know, but I also raised an eyebrow at "blogger". It would be a really cheap way of demeaning someone's position and work if you wanted to. At the very least, I'd rather we all be charitable about the parties involved, and the term blogger has baggage associated with it, unlike writer/editor/etc.
How is it not a blog? Kotaku is also a blog. Just because it's popular doesn't mean it's not a blog.
I think you're really stretching here. I didn't see any kind of underlying ofense or demean there.
A lot of people see Kotaku and other sites as blogs and not really in a offensive way. Also relevant: A lot of bloggers are really relevant.
You could say he tries to do that at the beggining (with the whole banal thing), but to jump to this conclusion just from blogger is kinda silly
But he doesn't in any moment try to demean the writer in the article. You guys are interpreting all of this just from "blogger". Like, really stretching.
Messofanego
Banned
I've never even heard of a videogame allowing characters to be asexual. Dwarf Fortress must be one of the most impressive videogames ever made that I never want to play XD
If he had "old school ideas" about sexuality, everyone would be "straight".
Some of the most ridiculously controversy I've seen in a long time.
The fact that an article was written about this is insane. The anger from people is insane.
The guy wilfully decided to have gay people in the game and people are calling him out for being homophobic/sexist?
His responses seem pretty damn reasonable.
The fact that an article was written about this is insane. The anger from people is insane.
The guy wilfully decided to have gay people in the game and people are calling him out for being homophobic/sexist?
His responses seem pretty damn reasonable.
He has actually written a post on reddit defending his stance. Now I agree that some things may be ignorance and also that the writer at RPS is taking it out of context a bit too much (it also seems there was an older article about the mechanic but purely as a game mechanic, and most information is got from there).
His mains points of defence are that people are not bi/straight/gay based on the code, it only affects the chance to attempt a romance. As an example most people would thing his women are straight and see one in ten that has a lesbian relationship. In my own game I have 2 men and 8 women and there is only one relationship (men-women) so it makes a bit of sense.
It is also a strong point for the disability. He says people that can't move or talk on that moment have a big penalty, because if someone is sick on bed/waiting for an operation it would look silly to see someone hitting on them, and I agree it makes sense to avoid it from a game perspective.
His mains points of defence are that people are not bi/straight/gay based on the code, it only affects the chance to attempt a romance. As an example most people would thing his women are straight and see one in ten that has a lesbian relationship. In my own game I have 2 men and 8 women and there is only one relationship (men-women) so it makes a bit of sense.
It is also a strong point for the disability. He says people that can't move or talk on that moment have a big penalty, because if someone is sick on bed/waiting for an operation it would look silly to see someone hitting on them, and I agree it makes sense to avoid it from a game perspective.
yeah his reasoning for that part especially was really sound. Makes the original complaint about that pretty stupid
LurkerPrime
Member
I'm echoing everyone else, the asexuality thing in Dwarf Fortress is a really smart addition. It seems so obvious in retrospect.
This is where I am re: "blogger." Just feels like every word he uses to refer to Claudia or the article is seething with... not malice, but something close.
Though I admit I didn't realise that people classified anything other than hobbyist websites as "blogs."
This is where I am re: "blogger." Just feels like every word he uses to refer to Claudia or the article is seething with... not malice, but something close.
Though I admit I didn't realise that people classified anything other than hobbyist websites as "blogs."